EXTRA EDITION SQUALLS BETWEEN TWO WHEELS

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 116, 18 May 1914, Page 8

EXTRA EDITION SQUALLS BETWEEN TWO WHEELS

A CEASELESS SOUTH-EASTER. People who have short memories of the trickiness of eouth-easters' aie the sport of the wild rain-laden winds. A glint of sunshine and a patch of blue, just before they start off for work in the morning, raise hopes that the strength of the storm is at last failing. The crcduloui ones may be deceived into discarding 6omo of the usual safeguards against storms — and they step buoyantly under tho brightening , sky. Suddenly something like a fiendish peal of laughter reminds them that they have boon duped ; the voice of the tempest is shrill among the housetops. It is short notice of another fit of anger, and then cornea tho thrashing rain. When a south-easter settles in Cook Strait the oldest inhabitants are not beguiled by a bit of blue nor by a sickly smile of' the sun. They know that they are concerned with • a pitiless practical joker, which usually loiters in the locality for somo days. Two years ago, in mid-winter, a south-easter worked in these parts, with few holidays, for five or six weeks, and a very wet Wellington marvelled at the news of bush fires in Weetland and the destruction of sawmills. Also gold-mining operations there were interrupted by the lack of water. Similarly this morning when tho drenching wind was the screaming drover of countless herds of murky clouds, citizens could have easily believed that tho gloom was widespread. Yet Farewell Spit, at the top of the South Island, had a clear blue sky at 9 a.m. Wellington has the misfortune to be caught at present between two wheels of air. One of the whirling movements ia cyclonic, with a centre somewhere near Cape Egmont. If this visitor*— the south-east scourge — played according to the meteorological rules, the centre should be moving eastward, but it is sticking near Cape Egmont. Thus Cook Strait is on the edge of a low-pressure uwish, and is also close to the rim of a high-pressure anti-cyclonic System, which the South Island is enjoying. Below Cape Campbell the weather was generally pleasant, comparatively, this morn: ing. As the aerial wheels are whirling in opposite directions the inhabitants of the city can uncterstanci why the atmosphere seems to be so viciously energetic at times. These are the days when the unguarded hat may be whisked aloft and awept soon out of sight. Mr. Bates offers some comfort by referring to another low pressure advancing from the west. Generally, such an intruder is no better than its name ; sometimes it happens that one low pressure will be a boon companion to another, and the two will shake up a town considerably, but this time the low visitor may prove si friend. It may act a brake on the cruel wheel of the south-easter, and thus a lull may give the_ amateur gardeners a few minutes in which to repair t some of the wreckage.